St. Francis of Assisi parishioners gather in the Harrisburg church's basement Sunday morning for a post-Mass meal. There they also watched news broadcasts of Pope Francis on a donated television.
(Julianne Mattera | jmattera@pennlive.com)

Sarina Flores' face glowed Sunday morning, and it wasn't from laboring in St. Francis of Assisi's kitchen to help feed more than 100 parishioners gathering in the church's basement for a post-Mass meal.

As news broadcasts of Pope Francis' visit to Philadelphia played on a donated television behind her, the 54-year-old Flores jubilantly recalled her overnight trek to see the pontiff on Saturday -- an experience the devout Catholic from Harrisburg called the "chance of a lifetime."

"It was such an honor," Flores said. "We stood for like 12 hours actually in one spot. You could feel the peace, the tranquility in there."

Flores also said she could feel "the presence of the Holy Spirit."

"Everyone was so excited to see the holy pope coming through," she said.

Flores, her husband, a couple friends and two small children left Friday at midnight for Philadelphia "to beat the traffic." They got to Philadelphia at 2 a.m., parked and then slept in the car until around 7 a.m., at which point, they walked 45 minutes to the vicinity of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway.

They stayed there the entire day, and eventually, when Pope Francis rolled by in his popemobile, Flores estimated she and her group were only about 20 feet away.

"I feel so blessed," Flores said. "What an honor to see the Holy Father."

Television broadcasts, however, would be the closest most of the church's parishioners would come to seeing Pope Francis this weekend, and some parishioners said the donated television allowed the community experience such a historic visit together.

Franciso Perez and Ramona Morales, Perez's wife, could have watched Francis from their home in Lower Paxton Township, but Morales said it was much more enjoyable to share the experience with people in her church.

"It's the unity," Morales said. "We are gathered together."

Born in Argentina, Francis is the first Latin American pope, and that gives Morales a sense of pride. Morales and Perez immigrated to United States from Puerto Rico, and Perez said the parish is make up of a "mixed Hispanic community," hailing from places like Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Columbia, Costa Rica and Mexico.

Rev. Orlando Reyes, a Capuchin Franciscan friar and head pastor at St. Francis of Assisi in Harrisburg, translated for Perez who told PennLive in Spanish that, after all of the bad things that have happened within the Catholic church, such as clergy sex abuse, that Pope Francis is planting a seed of "hope and faith" in "the heart of the community."

"We can see it in all of the cities and places that he has been," Reyes said, translating Perez's words. "You can see the seed of hope and faith."

After St. Francis' 10 a.m. Mass, about 140 people gathered in the basement for a meal - prepared by Flores and others - of rice, chicken, potato salad, tossed salad and pernil, a seasoned pork dish. As they ate and the room buzzed with conversation, a news broadcast of Pope Francis' visit to Curran-Fromhold Correction Facility played in the background.

The church's basement is open all day Sunday, with parishioners expected to fill it for a post-Mass meal at 2 p.m. People also are welcome there at 4 p.m. to watch Francis celebrate Mass on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway.

Reyes had tickets to papal events, but he decided to stay with his parishioners instead this weekend.

And on Sunday, in between warmly greeting parishioners in Spanish with a hug, Reyes emphasized how the television donation helped his parishioners watch Pope Francis together as a community.

"Thanks to those who donated the TV, we were not just able to pray with the Holy Father but be able to see him, as well, here with the entire community, particularly those that were not able to attend to all those events," Reyes said.

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